


The New Old Business of Stark Industries

by ehcanuck



Category: The Avengers (Marvel Movies), The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: Age Regression/De-Aging, Animal Transformation, Avengers Grade, Gen, Gender or Sex Swap, Hulk's stretchy pants, Nicknames, POV Tony Stark, Tony Stark Hates Magic, and just, cause been reading a lot of AUs and whatnot, how ridiculous things are, process of innovation and creation, what if characters were also aware
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-12-22
Updated: 2014-12-22
Packaged: 2018-03-02 21:54:25
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,372
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2827376
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ehcanuck/pseuds/ehcanuck
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It's been a few years since SHIELD fell and Tony took the Avengers in.<br/>While he knew that he would be supplying and maintaining most of their tech (if only because of his own pride and curiosity), he did not see this coming.<br/>Because really? Winter coats? Water filters? Hearing Aids?<br/>Just, how was this now his life?</p>
            </blockquote>





	The New Old Business of Stark Industries

**Author's Note:**

> AN – Because have been reading a lot of magical mayham stories.  
> I don't own any of the characters mentioned in this, only my idea.

Tony leaned back in his chair while absently twirling a screwdriver in his hand and wondering, not for the first time, how this had become his life.

Well, in a way, he supposed he knew the answer to that; it didn't take a genius really.

It could be said to start with a friend in a cave that he pointedly did _not_ think about but, in truth, most of the madness in his life stemmed from meeting the collective of traumatized idiots who were too damn stubborn to stop fighting called the Avengers.

This stubbornness was probably a good thing as frankly Tony wasn't entirely sure that the eastern seaboard could handle the crap that they regularly had to go up against; nevermind the world on the odd occasion that shit _really_ went down.

Anyway, he digressed and turned his thoughts back to the matter at hand which was really _how the hell was this his life_.

Since the fall of SHIELD two years earlier and since putting the team back together and making Avengers Tower their ~~home~~  base, they had had to deal with science gone wrong, science gone purposely wrong and ~~magic~~ advanced presently inexplicable science gone wrong which sometimes had the odd additional side effect of making their individual lives...hellish.

On the flip side, this had resulted in a remarkable amount of inspiration on Tony's end as he had wanted ~~his friends~~ his teammates to have the best and things they could trust and really, that meant something he had a hand in making (or at least had done a thorough background check and overseen the hand that made it). This in turn had resulted in STARK industries branching out like it hadn't since he had shut down all the weapons divisions.

There was the standard body armour improvements in addition to assisting in maintaining and improving their equipment as needed; all of which he had been expecting to make and do. He had also expected to provide and replace the general tech that the Avengers used like the coffee maker, tablets, phones and computers. But the rest?

Yeah, that shit had come _far_ out of the left field.

Well, to start, he had invented (with his new science buddy) a new polymer for Bruce and Hulk that stretched and contracted with them. This probably should not have come as much of a surprise but considering all the footage he had seen, he had thought Bruce had already done so rather then it being simple sheer luck that his pants were more or less intact in the film snippets. So there was that; the fabric had proved popular with companies that made athletic clothing and had prompted the US Olympic Commission to request specialized samples for their athletes to test.

He had never thought that athletic equipment would ever provide a challenge for him but he had had to develop punching bags strong enough to withstand Thor, Steve and him and Rhodey in their suits, mouthguards for Thor and Steve when they brawled and treadmills and exercise bikes with higher speeds and greater variants in programs. For she-of-many-names and bird-brain, he had had to create and constantly improve on moving targets and training simulations to keep them on their toes.

Then, a few weeks after SHIELD fell (he should have noticed, he had been in their system, _why hadn't he noticed_ ), an unfrozen Han Solo showed up with a traumatized Skywalker in need of a new limb that didn't possess a kill switch, tracking chip, an incendiary bomb and an internal mind-altering drug IV... Well, it took a few days but then Terminator had a new arm, much to the Capsicle's relief, and soon after STARK had made its first foray into prostheses.

With the fall of SHIELD, it then also became necessary that they have their own highly mobile transport to where they were needed and as his tentative offer of making everyone who couldn't fly Iron Man-esque suits piloted by JARVIS was rejected, Tony instead turned to learning all he could about transport and soon had developed a series of planes, boats and all-terrain vehicles to suit their needs. Rejected versions were then modified and sold for the public and American army's needs - no weapons, they were for transport _only;_ Tony was a man of his word after all.

In addition to improving their comms; after discovering the Clint was almost completely deaf (60% in the left ear and nearly 80% in the right) when the man's hearing aids not only shorted out but had shocked and burned him in the process, he suddenly developed a completely coincidental interest in the field. After all, it was pretty much unnecessary to say that Tony did not stand for that kind of shoddy workmanship in his home. After a fair amount of trial and error, he had created a pair of aids that clearly picked up sound from 250 Hz to 17kHz and from 15m away, were waterproof and practically indestructible while remaining fairly flexible and comfortable to leave in. They were still quite expensive and so not really ready for the public markets but Tony was working on it.

Gas masks had been one of those revolutionary innovations that had followed after numerous villains-of-the-week turned various kinds of gases loose onto New York and the eastern seaboard. The new filters could last two weeks before needing to be replaced and screened out everything from dust to smoke to poisonous gas and so could be used in construction, labs, emergency services and in more militant confrontations.

Following one memorable occasion where Loki rolled into town and left the Falcon as a falcon, the Widow as a cranky pussycat, Thunderstruck as some unknown breed of dog and Cap and Sarge transformed into a wolf and raven respectively ( _of course_ they were animals known to have symbiotic relationships); STARK had released a strain of pet supplies of all sorts soon after due to Tony's frustration at being unable to help in restoring them. This included everything from cat litter (to be the least smelly and clean), to brushes, to perches, to pet shampoo, to unbreakable toys and even a simple tablet where more intelligent pets could hit buttons that would then voice their requests.

An encounter with Baron Zemo and some weird pollen thing had left everyone who hadn't had a super-fast metabolism (Big Green, Spangles and Red October) or a gas mask on (himself, ~~Iron Patriot~~ _War Machine_ and Rescue) – aka Birdbrain 2.0, Merida, Femme Fatale and Hammer Time – hypersensitive to everything. Leaving both his science bro and his newly recruited ladies of science Jane and Betty to figure out a cure, Tony began improving what he could in the mean time. He had modified the lights to be dimmed as needed and the ventilation to remove any and all scents a long time ago but found that selective sound cancelling and dulling headphones were needed along with improved temperature control in separate rooms and the creation of another new polymer fabric that wouldn't irritate supersensitive skin so the quartet could at least be warm (having shed their clothing and rejected all other methods of covering themselves as too much).

A better water purifier along with water testers and chemical neutralizers was developed after they fought Madame Hydra, also later identified as Viper, who had emerged as one of the replacement heads of Hydra and managed to poison the entire water supply for New York. And the less said about that the better as she had got frighteningly close to succeeding.

When AIM came back under the leadership of MODOK to take over the west coast, in the ensuing fight, Steve had gotten a face full of acid and had become temporarily blind. It was in that moment that Tony decided to make all the living quarters as disability friendly as possible because it was inexcusable to him that Steve be rendered almost helpless and had had to have someone at his elbow and if this was something that was going to be a thing, then he wanted to be ready. Within a day, there was braille in all the private areas (the public parts, the STARK industries parts, were already up to code and then some), JARVIS and he wrote a sub-program into the AI so he could provide as much assistance as possible and the floors were completely redone so that Steve's new cane would sound different in the tiled kitchen then it would in the now-carpeted commons then it would on the stone floors in the bathrooms and the hardwood floors of the bedrooms. In a month Steve's eyes had completely healed and Tony then set about fixing everything else (after all, changing the layout when Steve was relying on his memory would've been rather cruel) so that the hallways were wide enough to accommodate wheelchairs, putting in ramps where there had been stairs and hanger bars in the bathrooms (and having spare ones ready to be installed elsewhere as needed), changing the wiring of the lights that should Clint not have his aids in or someone else developed hearing loss that they could be made to flash when their phone/pager was ringing or when someone was at the door and the like. By the end of the week Tony had developed and improved on a wealth of new disability friendly electronics and architectural features.

Things got really weird when the Enchantress came after them, furious that Thor had left Asgard and taken a mortal lover. Her attack left all the men as women and while Thor and Steve acted like nothing had changed and adapted with aplomb; the rest of them...not so much. Rhodey and Sam weren't too far off the calmness scale though they had gotten spectacularly smashed as soon as they could while Bruce was probably the next closest, going to make a shirt out of the polymer after he de-Hulked hours later so that if he happened to Hulk out, he didn't get any more bad publicity for being topless. The other three, well, Tony didn't mind being a woman per se as he did mind his body being altered _again_ without his consent and spent most of his time snapping at anyone who got too close while pretending he was fine. He was pretty sure Bucky had felt the same considering how the other had just retreated into his mind and remained... blank (was that the best term? There was really no words to describe the emptiness in the man's eyes) until they managed to get the spell reversed. Clint however, Clint had a terrible case of body dysphoria so that he couldn't look at himself in a mirror or otherwise (he was _wrong_ ) and was in a near constant cycle of panic attacks coupled with anxiety and misery. So while the rest of them more or less resigned themselves to bras and the like, Tony made Clint a number of chest binders that wouldn't restrict his breathing or movement but made his chest look as flat as it always did in addition to providing a cup for his pants so the archer could at least pretend that everything was as it should be and he was in the right body.

Shortly after they got that reversed and sent the Enchantress back to Asgard, Loki came back as he wasn't about to be outdone and Tony, Pepper and Rhodey found themselves to be the guardians of a number of tiny Avengers. Between Tony having a minor freakout about how to deal with children and being understandably upset that Brucie, Clint and Tasha were already traumatized and showing signs of abuse at age five, they had a good time. Soon after they managed to reverse _that_ , STARK release a bunch of child care product line as both Sammy and Thor had been afraid of the dark and required nightlights, Stevie required a better childseat when driving around to prevent his slight frame from bruising and having an asthma attack and no child's toy was advanced enough to keep Bruce occupied once he was convinced that he _was_ allowed to play.

What medical equipment Tony had had to modify and create was best left unsaid; the amount of times they had nearly lost one of the members of their team due to inadequate scans, filtration, transfusions and the like was enough to keep Tony up late into the night trying to preemptively create what would be needed next. Though he had to admit that the weird blood filtration and removal device he had created when Itsy Bitsy Spider had been turned into a vampire was a work of art.

When Thor had requested their assistance and presence in negotiating a peace between the inhabited nine realms, Tony then created an enormous amount of winter gear so that even those among them who were the most sensitive to cold were warm in the icy halls of Jötunheimr.

So in the last five years, STARK had not only shut down its weapons division and become a technological mogul but had also become an example for, competitor and sought after brand in the textile industry, athletic supplies, transport industry, architecture, disability services, child supplies and toys, pet supplies, medical innovation and...just, Tony's head was spinning from how fast these separate divisions were popping up. The media was not helping joking about how there was now an additional grade of quality: Avengers Grade, something his PR department had embraced and jumped on with slogans like “warm enough to withstand the absolute zero temperatures of Jötunheimr”, “car seats guaranteed to keep your little solider safe” and “sleek and modern phones that withstand a super-strong beating” and other such nonsense.

And now he was having to build a machine that would allow for travel between dimensions in order to send the fifteen versions of himself that had somehow ended up here back home.

The thing was, he had seven doctorates from ones he had personally earned and defended to honorary ones that had been granted to him but considering how often he was surprised and challenged, he supposed he should consider getting one in _what-the-actual-fuck._

 


End file.
